Programme planning in ece free essay sample

Programme planning is a vital part in an early childhood education service to provide quality education and care for the children. Throughout my essay I will be describing the purpose of programme planning in an early childhood education setting which will include the examples of how programme planning can be used and the components of programme planning and how they are related to Te Whaariki which is the â€Å"national curriculum for early childhood sector†. (Ministry of Education, 1996. p. 7) To do programme planning in an early childhood education service, the educators link their planning to the documents, which are the Desirable of Objectives (DOPs), Te Whariki and the Regulation, 2008. In an early childhood education service planning cycle has no end. It is a continued cycle. According to the Te Whariki it states that â€Å"Planning the curriculum Whariki should be a continuing process, involving careful observation, identification of needs and capabilities, provision of resources, assessments, and evaluation†. We will write a custom essay sample on Programme planning in ece or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page (Ministry of Education, 1996. p. 28) The purpose of programme planning in an early childhood education service is to improve the ways that the educators work with children, help the educators to understand each child’s interest, strengths, needs, weaknesses, skills, knowledge, personality and cultural background and to find the learning and development progress of children. (Ministry of Education, 1998. p. 30). â€Å"Planning also help the educators to understand what children are learning, how the learning happens and the role that both educators and children play in children’s learning and development†. (Ministry of Education, 1996. p. 28) To do planning, educators set goals and provide quality programmes to help children to learn and develop. According to Te Whaariki the purpose of planning is also to provide safe environment of learning and development for children in an early childhood education service as stated that â€Å"each early childhood education setting should plan its programme to facilitate achievement of the goals of each strand in the curriculum†. (Ministry of Education, 1996. p. 28) In an early childhood education service, educators plan so that they could create quality programmes and refer back to make improvements to their programme. For example, to extend on the children’s interest and to find out the area they may need to improve on such as social, intellectual, emotional, physical and spiritual skills. The purpose of programme planning is also to ensure that the early childhood education service is providing learning programmes in accordance with the Ministry of Education (MOE) requirements. The educators need children’s voice, parents’ suggestions and ideas of the plan that helps them for their further development in the planning process. Programme planning involves many components. According to Ministry of Education (1998), the educators follow the components of DOPs three, which states that planning cycle for the programme planning is to â€Å"ensure that the curriculum facilitates the learning and development of the children† in their service. (Ministry of Education, 1998. p. 30). The planning cycle is on-going process. The first component is observation. This is a process of gathering the information, where the educators watch, taking notes and record what the children’s interest, behaviour and actions for the progress of the child’s learning and development skills, knowledge, interests, needs, strengths, values and understanding. (Ministry of Education, 1998. p. 30). These observations will help staffs and the parents to know where the child’s strengths and weaknesses are. There are some rules for observation in an early childhood services such as when the educators do observation, they should not interrupt the child otherwise the child will lose the interest from whatever he or she is working on, before doing observation the consent form need to be signed by the parent or caregiver for the permission to observe and according to Code Of Ethics for Registered Teacher (2004) the educators should respect the right of the child and the parent. The information that educators gather should be kept confidential and only used for child’s learning and development, that is the reason the Code of Ethics is very important in early childhood education services â€Å"to enhance the protection of children and those who work within the service†. (National Working Group, 1994). The second component is interpret and analyse, this is a process to examine the observation carefully, in order to identify the child’s interest, ability and skill which will help the educators to identify exactly what the children’s needs and improvements are. The third component is set learning objectives, this is the process when educators set out goals of what they expect children should achieve at the end of the programme which they plan. Also to find out the best programme, resources and activities that should be place in the learning environment. The fourth component is plan learning experiences. This process consider seven essential learning areas. These are language, mathematics, science, technology, social science, art and physical well-being. (Ministry of Education, 1996. p. 94). For example, activities that children have some prior knowledge such as cooking or weaving at home with mum. The Fifth component is development and implement teaching strategies. This process is the methods and ways of operating activities in regards to the practice. Good teaching plans will support children to develop holistically. All strategies should invite all the children to be involved or participate. So that children can become competent and confident in learning as stated in Te Whariki’s vision for children is â€Å"to grow up as competent and confident learners and communicators, healthy in mind, body, and spirit, secure in their sense of belonging and in the knowledge that they make a valued contribution to the society†. (Ministry of Education, 1996. p. 9). Assessments help teachers to document and share the information to parents and whanau. Assessments are used to gather information about children’s progress and achievements that will help their future learning and development of the children. It is used to improve the quality of teaching programmes. Assessment is used to find out a child’s ability, knowledge and skills, it also encourages. In the result of an assessment educators could identify the children’s strengths and weaknesses, so they can share child’s progress with parents, family, whanau and community. The sixth component is evaluate results. This process is to know if goals have been achieved or not. For example, did all the children in the centre enjoy it or participated in the activity? Evaluation is what educators do in relation to their plans or learning and teaching goals. The seventh component is reflect. This process is when educators reflect on the whole process, to see if there are any needs to make improvement. Educators do reflection of their planning to ensure that the activities have provided for children have included all the children in the centre, whether the safe environment has been set out and relevant resource has been given to children for their learning and development. According to the Regulation 2008 it states that the early childhood education services must â€Å"take all the reasonable steps to promote the good health and safety of the children attending the centre†. (Regulation, 2008). Reflection can also help the educators, parents, family, whanau and the community to celebrate the progression in children’s work. This planning cycle allows the educators to be professional in an early childhood education service so that they could provide quality service. (Ministry of Education, 1998. p. 30) The two documents Te Whariki and Quality in Action (DOPs) components relate to each other because it explains about educators, parents, whanau working together in a close relationship to develop strength and to empower them, so that all of the learning and development is holistic for the child. As stated in Te Whariki â€Å"children will grow into a competent and confident learner, secure in mind, body and soul; also knowing that children’s strong sense of belonging so they could make a valuable contributions to the society in future†. (Ministry of Education, 1996. p. 9). Te Whariki support educators to provide quality programmes that plan, evaluate and assess learning and development of the children. Te Whariki is to maintain â€Å"consistency of high quality care and education for all children in New Zealand†. (Ministry of Education, 1996. p. 7) The early childhood education centre philosophy tells us about the kind of programme the centre provide for children, parents, families and whanau and the community. The educators ensures that the philosophy should be the basis for their programme. The Kiwicare Childcare Centre’s philosophy is â€Å"healthy bodies educated minds†. According to the Kiwicare Childcare Centre policies the teachers always have a quality adult to children ratio. According to the Regulation 2008 the role of an adult in an early childhood education setting is to provide quality care and education for children. (Regulation, 2008). The teacher’s role in the Kiwicare Childcare Centre is to provide the quality environment and natural resources to enhance children’s learning and development. For example, wood, clay, sand and insects for children to learn and develop. Adult role helps children to extend their learning and development through scaffolding, guidance and support. According to the theorist Vygotsky, he believes that the children’s â€Å"learning needs support, guidance, and modelling to make it happen†. (Penrose, 1998, p. 73). Vygotsky also believes that â€Å"working together gives opportunities for the child to explore the experience†. The teacher’s role at Kiwicare Childcare Centre is to encourage children, teachers, family and community to build warm responsive relationships. In the centre every staff work together to contribute to the planning and work towards their goals. Parents, family and whanau and community involve to celebrate special events, cultural functions. For example bringing in elder to tell culture stories, dance and song to all the children in the services. The teaching strategies that teachers at Kiwicare Childcare Centre uses to help children’s learning and development is role modelling. This strategy inspire the children to make a difference or want to be like adults. Children like to copy what adult do. For example a girl saw the teacher taking photo with camera. After that she runs to the toys box looking for the toy camera, and shows to the teacher that she is taking photos with camera too. Teacher’s use simple or clear instruction to children so that they will understand and become competent and confident learner in later life. Teachers demonstrate the activities at the mat time and ask questions to engage the children to the programme. In my conclusion, I would like to say that the programme planning is important element in early childhood education setting. The DOPs three clearly describe that the planning cycle is an on-going process, which can start at any of the stage. In a quality early childhood education service, they must apply the documents which is provided by the Ministry of Education. PLANNING FOR YOUNG CHILDREN IN AN EARLY CHILDHOOD EDUCATION SERVICE Theme: Promoting Healthy Eating in Kiwicare Childcare Centre. Date: 18/03/2014 Time: 8:45am Duration: 20 minutes Age Group: 2. 5 – 4. 5 years Strands: Well Being Goal: Children experience an environment where their health is promoted. Learning Outcome: Children develop: Knowledge about how to keep themselves healthy. Self-help and self-care skills for eating. Positive attitudes towards eating. Increasing understanding of their bodies and how they function. Teaching Resources: Artificial fruits. (banana, apple, pear, orange and grapes) Songs in different languages. (Samoan and English) Musical instrument. (using my resource Lalli while singing) Pictures Teaching Strategies: Art work Taking children to fruit shops. Support and help children in singing the fruit song. Providing fruit books for children. Make sure that children are safe while doing the activity. Delivery: Set the fruits and the musical instrument (lalli) on the mat. Introduce children with the fruits in English and Samoan language and the sing the song in English and Samoan language and paying lalli. Ask open ended questions. For example: what colour is banana, apple, orange, grapes and pear. SONG ENGLISH Apple, orange (2), banana (2), Pear and grapes (2), are good for you. SAMOAN Apu, moli (2), fai pula (2), Pea male vine (2) lalai moi e Assessment Activity: Children were so excited when they saw fruits on the mat. Five children came and join me. Children enjoyed the song in both language. Every child waited for their turn to play with the musical instrument. Evaluation: The activity was really good children took interest in singing and doing actions when I sing the song. Next time I will interact more with the children and have more fruits and also introducing numbers in different languages.